Muslim civil rights groups and community organisations have condemned a series of anti-Islamic advertisements that will be appearing in New York’s subway stations next week and which are considered insulting by ALL Muslims.

The ads had initially been rejected by the city’s Metropolitan Transport Authority (MTA) but were later allowed after a legal appeal ruled them to be expressions of freedom of speech. One ad reads: “In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat jihad.”

The ads are set to appear in at least 10 of the city’s 400 subways stations and have been designed and paid for by the controversial American Freedom Defence Initiative, which is led by outspoken anti-Islamist activist Pamela Geller. The AFDI has been termed an “active anti-Muslim group” by the civil rights watch dog organisation the Southern Poverty Law Centre.   »»» guardian.co.uk

In the West, the word “jihad” has come to be a synonym for “terrorist” because of its use by some radical “Muslims”. However, for Muslims in general “jihad” as nothing to do with terrorism.

Jihad is a religious duty of Muslims. In Arabic, the verb jahada means “strive” or “exert an effort”. Jihad is therefore a form of struggle or striving. The term appears frequently in the Qur’an and in common usage in the idiomatic expression “striving in the way of Allah (al-jihad fi sabil Allah)”. A person engaged in jihad is called a mujahid, the plural is mujahideen.

Jihad requires Muslims to struggle in God’s cause and to strive to improve one’s self and society. Jihad is directed against temptation, negative aspects of one’s own self, or a visible enemy. It is the effort of believers to establish God’s Kingdom among men.

Jihad can be classified as the greater jihad (al-jihad al-akbar), that is, the struggle against one’s lower self (an-nafs), or as the lesser jihad (al-jihad al-asghar), that is, an external, physical effort, which often involves fighting against an external enemy.

The primary historical basis for this belief is a pair of similarly worded Prophetic Traditions (hadiths), in which Muhammad (peace be upon him) is reported to have told warriors returning home from battle that they had returned from the lesser jihad of struggle in war to the greater jihad of struggle against self.

There are four categories of struggle in the cause of God (al-jihad fi sabil Allah):

Jihad of the heart (al-jihad bil-qalb) is concerned with combatting the devil and in the attempt to escape his persuasion to evil. This form of jihad is regarded as the greater jihad (al-jihad al-akbar).

Jihad by the tongue (al-jihad bil-lisan) is concerned with speaking the truth and spreading the word of Islam through the spoken or written word.

Jihad by the hand (al-jihad bil-yad) is concerned with choosing to do what is right and to combat injustice and wrongdoing with postive action.

Jihad by the sword (al-jihad bis-saif) refers to armed fighting in the way of God (al-qital fi sabil Allah). This category of jihad, which often takes the form of organized miitary action, is what is often mistranslated as “holy war”. Such a concept is foreign to Islam. The closest analogy in Western philosophy is the Christian concept of “just war”.

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